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Eligibility to Benefit from Anti-Crisis Measures: When is a Company a "Company in Difficulty"?

Posted on September 20, 2009 by Claeys & Engels

On 6 July 2009, one of the Decrees implementing the Law of 19 June 2009 on various provisions on employment in times of crisis, was published.

In order to benefit from certain anti-crisis measures, in particular the temporary regimes of economic unemployment for employees and  the so-called crisis time credit, the Law of 19 June 2009 stipulates that a company must prove that it meets one of the requirements for recognition as a "company in difficulty," meaning:

  •  a substantial fall of at least 20% of the turnover or the production during one of the four trimesters prior to the institution of the measure compared to the same trimester of the previous year; or
  • the introduction of economic unemployment for workers during 20% of the overall number of reported days to the National Social Security Office during the trimester preceding the demand.
This new Decree implementing the Law now clarifies the procedure a company in difficulty must follow when it comes to the taking of evidence.

In addition, it clarifies precisely that the criterion "fall in the production" must refer to  overall  production and not to certain components. This fall must be determined by a weighting in function of the importance of the various  products in the production process and must create a drop in productive employee working hours.

The fall in production is proved by submitting a file that is composed of VAT declarations, accounting documents and reports transferred to the Works Council.

This Royal Decree came into force on the date of publication of the law concerning anti-crisis measures in the Belgian Official Gazette, namely on 25 June 2009.
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